The Picture of Nobody Read online

  Maybe that had been a good plan, but now Dad’s factory was possibly going to lay him off. He needed my help.

  Each day, on my way home from the library, I studied the strip mall. There was a bus terminal, with a long line of GO buses going west to Toronto and east to Oshawa. Behind the buses were a dollar store, a bakery, a drugstore, and a video store. I was sure none of these stores would hire me, because I had no work experience. However, there was also a sort of run-down coffee shop named Sip and Sup. Two picnic tables sat outside. Maybe the owner wanted to create a sidewalk café. But the young men who sat there just smoked and gazed at the schoolgirls crossing the parking lot.

  One day, I walked into Sip and Sup. There were a couple of old people sipping and supping. They were also slurping. I couldn’t stand that sound. Maybe the owner should have named it Sip and Slurp.

  I was about to walk out when a small Chinese man behind the counter yelled at me: “What you want? Yes?”

  Was he used to shouting at the old people, who couldn’t hear properly? He surprised me so much that I blurted out, “I’m looking for a job.”

  “Busy today. Come back tomorrow and I tell you. Hah!” He laughed in one sharp explosion.

  I looked at all the empty tables, and on my way home I was sure he had meant: Bugger off. Come back tomorrow and I kill you. Nya ha ha.

  But I returned. He asked his questions as he moved from table to table, wiping each one with a wet rag. I followed him as I answered. No, I had no experience. Yes, I was in high school. No, I hadn’t taken any cooking courses. Yes, I could think ahead. He asked nothing about cleaning. Yet that was the job he offered me at the end of the interview. “One hour only. Every day. Six-fifty. You take?”

  I nodded.

  “You begin next month. First day.”

  Getting the job was easy enough, but convincing my father was another matter. Even after I explained that I would go to work only after spending an hour at the library. He asked so many questions. What kind of place would hire someone with no experience? How would I work and study at the same time? What did I know of cleaning tables? How could he explain the job to all his relatives in all those other countries? He would have to say that his son was becoming a janitor.

  In the end, it was Mom who convinced him. All she said was, “Aggy, this is not Uganda.” Such a simple statement! I never realized Mom was so powerful.

  I couldn’t wait for the beginning of March. On the first day of the month, I went to Sip and Sup right after my library research. The owner was reading a newspaper. Without looking at me, he said, “Mop and pail stay on this side and apron on that side.” He pointed to the left of the counter and then to the right. I waited for him to explain some more. After a minute or so, he lowered his newspaper and added, “You still here?”

  “Shouldn’t I clean the tables?”

  “Clean table in dirty room like pretty woman with no upstairs. Hah!” He brought up his newspaper so it hid his face. His tiny cackle and shaking hands made me think he had made some sort of joke.

  I put on the green apron and hauled the pail to one end of the place. It took me close to an hour to mop the floor and another twenty minutes to clean the tables. Throughout, I noticed the Chinese man peeking at me above his newspaper. Once, an old man with a red cap and a nose like a potato said to him, “See you got a new boy, Chum. Wonder how long this one’s going to last?”

  “We see, mister.” He said this in a sad, tired way, as if he expected I would not return the next day. But I was determined. On my way home, I tried to imagine all the benefits of working in Sip and Sup. Once I got used to mopping, it would be far easier. And Mr. Chum might increase my hours and even offer me a job behind the counter. Mr. Chum himself looked a little grumpy, but he had a really friendly name. However, the best reward of all would be seeing my parents’ face when I showed them my first pay.

  Chapter Five

  At the end of my first week at Sip and Sup, I realized that there were three groups of regular customers. They came every day and always chose the same tables. They also talked about the same topics. The old ladies sat just in front of the exit, dressed in what seemed like brand new coats and scarves. They usually talked about their dead husbands and about tulips. They were all powdered up, as if they had been invited to a tea party or something.

  In the left corner sat a group of old men. I thought their wives must still be alive because unlike the old women they chatted mostly about wars and government stuff. Black men wearing puffy coats and baseball caps made upthe third group. When they settled around their own table and began to talk and laugh loudly, the old men became quiet. They got lively only when the black men left to walk across the road to a high-rise building. The black men never stayed very long.

  Before I started working, I had noticed the three or four young men who often sat at one of the outdoor tables. They watched the neighbourhood girls. Now I saw that they never came into Sip and Sup to order anything. I don’t think Mr. Chum liked them hanging around the place. He would turn his newspaper pages roughly whenever he noticed them. Once I heard him grumbling about “idlers and roafers.” I took a while to realize that he meant “loafers.”

  One day as I was leaving to go home, one of the loafers asked, “Hey, buddy, do you speak Chinese?”

  When I said I didn’t, the group began to laugh. The next day, another loafer called out, “Hey, buddy, where are you from?”

  I guessed he meant before I moved to Ajax, so I answered, Napanee. Before that, another asked. New Brunswick, I told him.

  “What a comedian,” the first one said. He wasn’t laughing, though.

  When I got home, Mom asked her usual question: did I make any new friends? Mom felt that I was too shy and that I spent too much time in the library and on the computer. I blamed Allison for Mom’s worries because she often called me “geek” and “nerd.” Dad would take my side, though. “Talent without discipline is useless,” he would say.

  Anyway, that evening I told Mom that I had chatted for a minute with some boys outside the coffee shop. That seemed to put her in a really good mood. Then, during dinner, Dad told us about the new job he expected to begin soon.

  “Is it in Toronto?” Allison asked.

  “In Ajax, dear,” Mom said. “Making cell phone batteries.” I could tell my sister was disappointed and angry from the way she rapped her fork against her plate. I felt a little sorry for her, and I decided I would buy her a small gift when I got my first pay. Maybe a black wristband to match her necklace.

  Chapter Six

  I got my first pay exactly one month after I began working at Sip and Sup. Before Mr. Chum gave me the money, he waved it around as if it were a thousand dollars. “Now, don’t go spending on trip to Hawaii. Hah.”

  As I made my way down the outside steps, one of the young men asked, “Hey, buddy, what are you holding in your pocket?”

  “My first pay,” I told him rather proudly.

  A tall guy with a cap pulled low over his forehead had a slim beard running down his chin. It looked like a caterpillar. He said something about buying a detonator, which was strange. Why would I? I liked doing experiments and had sometimes thought of becoming a highwayengineer, but there was no way he would know that.

  I didn’t go home directly but went into the dollar store that was next to the drugstore. I wanted to shop for gifts. When I was about to leave, I noticed that the cashier looked a little familiar. She had a scarf tied over her head. Maybe I had seen her at school. When I got home, almost an hour late, Mom was waiting by the door. She looked worried. Dad and Allison were already having dinner. “What’s that?” Mom asked, looking at the two bags in my hands.

  “I bought some gifts for you.”

  “Is it Christmas in April now?” Allison asked, but I didn’t pay her any attention.

  “I got my first pay today.”

  “And already you are wasting it on nonsense,” Dad said.

  “Be quiet, Aggy,” Mom said, befo
re Dad could begin one of his lectures about his brothers in Uganda saving every single penny. She turned to me. “What did you get us, dear?” I emptied the bags on the sofa.

  Mom said, “Oh, how nice,” and “This will come in handy,” as she examined the vase andflowerpot and potato peeler and picture frame. She held up a light green lampshade. “This is perfect for your room, Allison. It will match the curtains.” Whenever I bought her gifts, Mom always made me feel like I’d picked the perfect things.

  I felt happy for the rest of the evening. Even when Mom warned me that I should always let her or Dad know when I planned to get home later than usual. I repeated what Allison had said months ago: Ajax is small and safe. All the crime and bad stuff happens elsewhere.

  I really believed that. And when I got all A’s in school, I imagined that this quiet town had played a small part. Mr. Chum even said he would give me an extra hour of work each day for the summer. I was as happy as I had been when I was a child in Fredericton.

  Then one day I overheard the Sip and Sup old men talking about some big plot to blow up important buildings in Ottawa and Toronto. They were reading an article from the Sun newspaper. They appeared younger than usual, maybe because they were all worked up. Getting upset made their cheeks rosy. One of the menalways wore a poppy pinned onto his coat. He kept his eyes on me the entire time I cleaned the table opposite the group.

  When I left to go home, one of the loafers yelled at me, “Hey, comedian, what’s your name?”

  “Tommy.”

  “Yeah? What about your last name?”

  I was about to say, Lohanna. Then I remembered how some of the boys at Prince Charles Public School in Napanee used to call me Lindsay, on account of my last name. As if I was Lindsay Lohan, that silly girl actress. I had felt so ashamed.

  “Whatsa matter? Is it Mohammed?” I shook my head. As I walked away, I heard him shouting other names. “Ali? Hussein?”

  When I got home, I learned more about what had bothered the old men so much. Mom and Dad sat in front of the television watching the news. The girl announcer had a worried smile. She was talking about the arrest of five or six young men earlier in the day. They belonged to some kind of group — the announcer called it a “terrorist cell.”

  The cell had been under secret observation by the police for a couple of months. A video clip showed the police leading the young men away in handcuffs. Then came an interview with a woman who insisted that they were all decent boys. They couldn’t have been involved in this plot, she said. They all came from good families and got high grades at school. “They even like hockey,” she added as the final proof of their innocence.

  Mom felt sad. “Why would they want to blow up these places, anyway?” she said. “This is Canada, for goodness’ sake. What have we ever done to anyone?”

  She probably hoped mentioning Canada would keep Dad from throwing in some reference to Uganda. Surprisingly, it was Allison who responded.

  “So what’s new? Places get blown up every day. Check the news.” She said this in her fake-bored voice, and when we all looked at her, she got up and added, “Remember the bombing in London that we saw on TV? Everyone’s still talking about that, even though it happened more than a year ago. No one remembers the poor guy who got shot by the cops in the subway because he was the wrong colour. Brazilian or something.”

  I was about to ask how she knew this when she said, “Later. I have to study.” She went into her room and closed the door.

  “This girl,” Mom said. “If it’s not one new phase it’s another.” Maybe it was my imagination, but Mom didn’t sound as playful as she usually did when commenting on one of Allison’s new phases.

  Chapter Seven

  About two weeks into the new school term, I saw Allison in the cafeteria. She was sitting with the dollar store girl and another brown girl who looked a bit older. I wondered if Allison had broken up with the Goth girls, who were sitting at the far end of the cafeteria. Maybe she had made different friends in her new classes.

  The dollar store girl smiled, and when Allison turned around and saw me, she frowned. As if I was spying on her. Still, I waved to the group. Dad would like Allison’s new friends more than he liked the Goth girls.

  Each week there was some newspaper story about the terrorist cell boys. The old men at Sip and Sup talked on and on about them. Surprisingly, so did the old ladies, who said things like, “You never know...” and “Could be anyone...” Their voices sounded the same as when they chatted about their dead husbands. Sort of sing-song and sad, as if they were playing with memories that were growing dimmer and dimmer each day.

  One evening, I spotted the man with the caterpillar beard sitting by himself on a picnic table bench outside. Even though it was a chilly fall day, he wore just a sweatshirt with the sleeves rolled up. On his left wrist I noticed a tattoo of a little girl. I saw him watching me, so I asked, “Where are your friends today?”

  “I don’t keep tabs on them. Where are yours?”

  “Friends? None to talk of.”

  “And why is that?” His voice matched the coldness in the air.

  “Too busy with school and work.” Because he seemed lonely sitting by himself, I added, “I’m working hard, because I’d like to become an engineer.”

  He looked away, towards a girl pushing a stroller through the parking lot. “Yeah, that’s nice.”

  It seemed he wanted to be alone, so I walked off. A strong breeze was blowing the leaves off the sidewalk. I hoped the caterpillar man would go into the coffee shop. He had to be freezing.

  The next day, I felt I had wasted my concern. Two of caterpillar man’s friends were with him. “Hey, everyone. It’s Terry,” he said. His friends laughed. A short, ugly guy with spiky hair said, “What’s up, Terry?”

  “It’s Tommy,” I told them.

  “No, I think it’s Terry,” the short guy replied.

  “Suit yourself.” As I walked up the steps, I heard them saying “Terry” over and over. As if it was a big joke. While I was cleaning the floor, I saw them glancing at me. I wondered what they were saying. I wished they knew more about me. Like how I was so sad when we moved from Fredericton. How I grew afraid of making new friends after that move. How much I hoped we would never move from Ajax. I pretended the caterpillar man was saying, “Kid wants to be an engineer. Good for him.”

  The old men had left early, but their cups and newspapers were still on their table. A copy of the Star newspaper lay open. I dusted off the crumbs and flipped through the pages. I froze when I got to page three.

  There was a picture of one of the terrorist cell boys. He looked nervous and excited and proud. As if he was about to deliver a long speech in a room filled with strange people. But it was the paragraph under the photograph that caught my eye. It began, “First year engineering student caught in the web.” Cell. Web. Terrorist. Explosion.

  As I was about to fold the newspaper, I heard a loud clap. I jumped and turned. “Floor, get clean now! Mop, jump up and dance!” Mr. Chum clapped again. “Tables, get clean fast!” More clapping. “Oh, no, magic not work today. So sad. So sad.”

  I quickly got the pail and began mopping. What Mr. Chum had said was funny, but I could not smile. The guy in the newspaper seemed too familiar. Bright, an only son, kept to himself, was polite to his elders, and his parents had come from some other country. He was normal in every way except for his secret meetings.

  All at once, I knew why the young men outside had insisted on calling me Terry. It was not a mistake for Tommy. They were calling me Terry because it was short for terrorist.

  I should never have mentioned my interest in engineering. Earlier, I had wished they knew more about me. Now I was afraid they knew too much. At the end of my shift, I walked down the steps as fast as I could. I could still hear their mocking voices. Terry. Terry. Terry.

  Chapter Eight

  As I walked home, I remembered an unlucky boy from a long-ago story. This boy had a black cloud floati
ng over his head. It followed him like a dirty, spiteful seagull. I looked up and saw a real black cloud. No, there were about a dozen. They looked like those animals that bit off parts of still-twitching prey. Hyenas or something. I walked faster, and by the time I got to our building, I was almost running.

  “How was work today, dear?” Mom asked when I got home.

  She asked that each evening, and as before, I told her, “Same as always.”

  “You look tired, though.”

  “I jogged home. It’s good exercise.”

  “Why the change?” Allison didn’t even bother looking up from the computer. I imagined her rolling her eyes and rocking her head. Just as she always did when Mom called me “chubby cheeks.”

  “It’s better than changing into a new person every five minutes just to fit in.”

  “Whatever.” The computer keys clicked. Maybe she was making fun of me with her Facebook friends.

  During dinner, Mom and Dad talked about their usual stuff. I remained quiet, even when Mom said that she was happy I had stuck with my after-school job for so long.

  I stayed at the table while everyone else went to watch television in the living room. But I could still see the TV. The announcer was interviewing some woman about the terrorist plot, a woman with curly red hair and an accent that made all her words seem zig-zagging. Even though she lived close to one of the accused boys, she said, she knew nothing of his family. “Quiet people, but who can tell anymore? Kept to themselves, you know...”

  Mom said, “There’s the cause, right there.” Dad began talking about Uganda. At the end of the show, Allison hurried to her computer and began typing.